Where does tea come from?

Tea is grown in Southeast Asia, Africa, Russia, South America, and to a limited extent, the United States. The largest producer of tea is India, consuming about 80% of their crop and exporting the rest. They are followed by China, which exports about 50% of their crop. The largest exporter of tea is Sir Lanka (Ceylon tea). Most of their crop is consumed in the Middle East, Africa, and the UK. Russia is also a large producer of tea but most of their tea is used for internal consumption and they actually import tea. There have been some specialty teas coming from this area in the past few years.

The tea grown in the United States is grown in Charleston, South Carolina on the Charleston Tea Plantation. This farm was originally started by Lipton as an experiment in growing tea locally for consumption in the US. High labor cost and low production forced Lipton to abandon this project. It is still in use today as more of a novelty of the only tea grown in the US.

The largest exporter of tea to the United States is Argentine followed by China.
Most tea in the US comes from Argentine and China, and the better quality teas from Malawi, or Indonesia. Teas from these countries tend to cloud less and work very well in Iced Tea which makes up 80% of the US market.

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